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LED "Stone" Outdoor Garden Light

I have installed quite a few garden lights over the years and have found that they either cost a small fortune or they quickly wear out in both functionality and esthetics.

Today solar lights are the big push. Although solar lights are great for marking a path in the darkness and can look pretty with the right application, they seem to be made much cheaper than the cheapest 12 volt lighting. I don’t really consider them garden “Lights” at all as they produce very little light. Also, in the northern climate where I live, they shut off early on the long dark winter days when you need them the most.

Wanting an affordable alternative to these problems, I came up with my own design using all easily acquired materials (which was a challenge in itself) and knowing that it can be difficult to create another one in the future after the project details have been long forgotten, I decided to put the extra effort into creating a step-by-step.

Being interested in DIY projects, I recently came across the Instructables website and wanted to share my project but I certainly don‘t want to rebuild the whole process from scratch so I‘m sharing it this way.

At a glance the project looks long and intimidating but it’s just because the process is in such great detail. These are quite easy to build, especially after the first one and they really light up an area or pathway. They could easily be hooked up daisy chain style to a battery with an adequate solar panel to create some very bright, high quality garden lights, especially with the low power consumption of the led bulbs. Here's the guide ~ "Build Your Own "Stone" Garden Lights"

Excellent! May you one day have an amazing garden. I love to know when people like it and would like to use it. If you ever do, be sure and post pictures on my website’s facebook page. Thanks for your comment!

Is it just the ring around the middle that lights up? Cause if I were you, I'd try to find a way to make the post light up with the "stonework" as a gobo. Make it kind of like the glowing stones from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

It’s a great idea. They actually have a transparent concrete available now that I would LOVE to work with but it’s not yet cost effective. You just add fiber optic beads instead of sand. Pretty cool stuff!

This contest is for LED's! Your bulbs are 12VDC incandescent. You are out of the running from square one. Do you know what an LED is? Light Emitting Diode! Anyone can run a string of 12 VDC kights from a transformer. LED's won't run from your 12 VDC Transformer, they will burn out the second you plug it in! I see your little incandescent 12 Volt Direct Current bulbs in one of your steps.But your stone thingy is OK. All you need to do is make it with LEDDDDDDDD's! Then resubmit your ible and I will vote on it! Good try!

Well there aren’t a whole lot of pictures but if you go through the process I’m certain you will see this two and a half minute video http://youtu.be/dulgRlqiB5M showing how to fit the LED into the socket. If you were unaware an LED can be used on a common 12 Volt string ran from a transformer nowadays, well, that’s one of the great things I was trying to show folks. You ought to heck them out here: http://www.stonecraftsite.com/columnlights/id15.html

This contest is for LED's! Your bulbs are 12VDC incandescent. You are out of the running from square one. Do you know what an LED is? Light Emitting Diode! Anyone can run a string of 12 VDC kights from a transformer. But your stone thingy is OK. All you need to do is make it with LEDDDDDDDD's!

So where is the light coming from? I see no LED anywhere! Did you forget that part? No instructions or picture comments? I don't know what some of the pictures are. Can you fix this? Certainly won't win any contests the way it is!